More budget madness

Chronicle readers were not pleased with Governor Schwarzenegger’s proposal to shut down 80 percent of California’s state parks—1.3 million acres of land—in an effort to close the budget gap.

Yet, I’d be willing to take the hit if it meant saving money for more vital programs. But, according to an NRDC analysis, that is simply not the case. The state parks program amounts, in its entirety, to less than one tenth of one percent of the state budget. And it brings in 80 million visitors a year, generating $2.1 billion in direct expenditures and $4 billion in indirect spending. The park service provides good government jobs for thousands of people, many of them vets.

Park lands also offer cheap getaway options for Californians weathering the economic downturn. New studies show that, nationally, the plummeting economy has brought an uptick in mental illness and stress-related physical illnesses. With nature a knownpalliative for stress, doesn’t it make sense to leave the parks open and potentially spare the state costlier medical expenditures?